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Friday, 15 April 2011

Maybe it is unfair to suggest that we Nigerians are people of the moment with very short attention spans along with excitable responses to the sensational laced with a penchant for being critical and unsatisfied whilst being the most impatient with everyone else but ourselves.

The elections taking place in Nigeria this April will reveal a lot about the kind of people we are, the opportunities we have that might be squandered, the potential we have that might not be realised and the evidence we have that might never be properly processed.

Amazing evidence capture

This evening a video went viral on both Twitter and Facebook depicting the blatant rigging of the election where a lady was busy thumbing sheaves of ballot papers, another lady on the lookout and two men who evidently saw what was going on without much concern and the National Youth Service Corps member who for his impartiality was engaged as one of the INEC staff sat at a desk ensuring that the affront to our democracy was validated.

It is important to understand that despite the great cost of this electioneering process, the purpose of the registration exercise was to eliminate bogus registrants from the voters’ register, the job of conducting free and fair elections can only be facilitated, and it cannot be guaranteed only with technology or adequately policed by INEC without the help and support of the public.

The voting system that we experienced last Saturday represented a complete change to what we were used to, voters were encouraged to participate fully in the electoral process from the time of accreditation through to after the voters have been counted and the results pasted at the Polling Units.

More importantly, voters were given license to take their mobile devices to their Polling Units to record events, report situations and take pictures. In this case, the video recorded is even more compelling evidence that needs to be pursued to its fullest conclusion.

Get those people – Quick!

That conclusion should be identifying the location of that Polling Unit, identifying all the faces and people involved in that electoral fraud, determining who could have put them to that illegal activity and prosecuting all those involved to the fullest extent of the law.

It goes without saying that the votes from that Polling Unit must be excluded from the final results whilst further investigations need to be made of the ballot papers from the Senatorial District to examine with the thumbprints are unique or the same – there is every likelihood, if followed through, that the election will be nullified and the people given a second chance at electing who they really want to represent them.

Boredom sets in

Hours have passed since the video featured in a tweet as Nigerians have latched unto a new fad with the hash-tag #deprivednaijachildhood and found ways to link that to the #NigeriaDecides hash-tag with every need to apprehend those vote rigging crooks now a distant memory.

I posted a tweet that recalled the video for a moment - Hours ago the vote rigging video went viral, it is now forgotten for #deprivednaijachildhood, #NigeriaDecides we get bored easily.

The analysis is obvious

In any case, the video rigging video offers INEC and the law enforcement authorities a lot of evidence to work on which could be made easier with help from the public.

There are at least two clear faces on that video, someone must know who they are, what are their names and their addresses – they should be easy to apprehend with information from colleagues, friends, family, neighbours or the community. The video shows they intended to get away with this crime and it was done with impunity, the more the reason to nab these crooks and make an example of them.

The video is introduced with names of someone who appears to have benefitted from this fraud and another who appeared to have lost because of the fraud – I would say we jump to no conclusions on the matter but the names help narrow down the location where the video was recorded.

Narrowing it down

The candidates mentioned were Dr. Nomate Toate Kpea and Hon. Magnus Ngei Abe; they were contesting in the Rivers South Senatorial District with the identification SD/095/RV; that being the 95th Senatorial District in Nigeria which covers the following Local Government Areas Andoni, Eleme, Gokana, Khana, Opobo/Nekoro, Oyigbo & Tai.

The Collation Centre for this Senatorial District is at Swanu-Finima Nwika Conference Hall in Bori.

The polling booth in which the rigging took place is labelled Unit 08 which means in one of those 7 Local Government Areas each of which is comprised of Registration areas there is a Polling Unit that ends with /008.

Maybe…

Obviously, JujuFilms Productions – a California-based company that uploaded the video unto YouTube might also have all that information and they can be contacted on info@JujuFilms.tv

If anything, it is important that these people be recused from any other electoral activity forthwith and it is incumbent on every Nigerian to ensure that we made the best use of our times at the Polling Units to report everything going on to prevent the blatant abuse of the electoral process by unscrupulous people.

As I finished this blog, I came across more evidence though not fully corroborated that gave names to the women involved in this activity. That evidence appears here.

A rewrite of this part

Taking out the inferences and allusions the evidence lead back to the YouTube origins of the video where JujuFilms Productions had posted another comment suggesting the lady in the red top whose face is quite clearly visible throughout the video is Baridi Naleloo, it states she is the PDP women’s leader of Ward 4 B-Dere and an employee of Gokana Local Government.

That is enough to match Unit 08 label on the Polling Booth to Ward 4 B-Dere in the Gokana Local Government of Rivers State and that gives us a PU Number of 32/12/04/008 located atC.P.S. I B-Dere, Giogon Boobana, Rivers State http://t.co/74QhKW8 with the description “The PU building is located at Gio-Gon Boobana Lebe square, B-Dere.”

The name given for the other lady whose is thumbing the ballot papers is Barivure, she is said to be an employee of the Rivers State University of Science and Technology. Going through the staff roll, I found that the prefix Bari- was common but could find no Barivure, which might be that she is of a much junior cadre.

INEC simply have to pick Baridi Naleloo up and she will no doubt sing like a canary; as for the other names and relationships, along with the paymasters that sanctioned this criminality, they should all be corralled and made a public show of.

Having cobbled together the PU Number from all the information obtained, it all seems to check out in the Senatorial District Finder, it can be no coincidence that all the names on the video and everything else just fits snuggly together, almost too conveniently.

4 comments:

AkinI said from the start I'm not convinced by this "election process".

Not only the two ladies, but those INEC members of staff who saw what was going wrong and did nothing about it. I'm sure this is not a unique occurrence.

Let's face it people think democracy is a big joke, just like so many other vital things like a sanitary environment, children's rights, same sex rights, uplifting the poor all these things and many more are just seen as an avenue by which the vulnerable can be exploited. This is the Nigeria of today, I hope tomorrow will bring something more positive from that nation that is our homeland...

As an after thought, if the police were serious about it. Before you could have posted this piece, you would have already reported that the culprits had been picked up along with those allegedly behind this affair.

The slow and comical pace at which the authorities are moving, assuming they are going to take action, indicates it's "no big deal" to them, business as usual.

If elections don't serve their purpose, the government becomes a joke. The uncaring civilians in the video add to the depressing tone. I stumbled on to this page looking for fall protection tips in rigging, and I come away with a greater sensitivity for your people.